Go4customer Blog

Perils faced by Call Center Industry in India

The call center industry has gone through drastic changes in recent times. Many customer support firms implemented new technologies for better customer satisfaction. However, some potential threats are still the same for the call center industry. Moreover, the call center in India still face some challenges that need to be taken care to bring better business results.

The newly implemented policies to maximize business performance in the future has not brought positive results for the Indian call centers, as the industry still faces many challenges in its way to success.

Despite the perks offered by new technologies, certain perils still act as a roadblock. Call centers propose several technology-based preferences to customers to enhance their experience. Moreover, the industry offers a self-service system along with agent support to enhance customer satisfaction. Still, some threats are stagnant and which avoid call centers’ to attain success.

India with time has become the top call center outsourcing destination, especially due to its call center and software industry. However, the challenges pull its efficiency down. Teresa Allen once well said:

“Plan for the worst while striving for the best. Your customer service reputation may have the ability to weather any storm!”

Teresa Allen

With this beautiful quote, here we have those threats that hinder effective customer support services for the call center in India:

High customer attrition

High customer attrition has always been an issue and it still raises an alarm for the call center industry. Since call center tasks are monotonous and require consecutive call handling services, the agents at times get frustrated.

This is the cause for huge attrition in call centers, as employees flee seeing rigid work hours and health issues that arise sitting back at work for longer times.

Moreover, in call centers, the agents are expected to behave friendlily with all customers no matter how many repetitive calls they take, which at times becomes pissing. This is the main cause of high attrition.

Further, after attrition, the business agents’ have to re-fill the vacant positions and have to train the hired employees too. This takes a lot of time and capital investment, which is challenging for the Indian call centers.

Can have negative effects on employee health

Call centers have this bad reputation of monotonous tasks that are quite demanding and have detrimental effects on the employees’ health. This is yet again another reason for high staff attrition.

Call center in India knows that it has to meet 24X7 service and to abide by that it demands a lot from employees. However, to avoid stress on the staff, it is essential for the call centers to bring adequate healthcare policies for the employees.

BPOs should also introduce break timings for the team to give relaxation so that they do not feel frustrated sitting at work for longer hours. When an agent is frustrated, her/his angry behavior reflects in the communication with customers.

High-priced property expenses

Earlier when the call center businesses started taking roots in India, who thought that prohibitive property costs would be a concern in future!

However, commercial property is not rated the same way as earlier today and has reached huge heights making it almost impossible to set up a new business.

This is the reason, starting a call center business in India is not as easy as it seems and companies need to overcome certain challenges to bring success.

High-rising international competition

With the boom in the call center industry, countries like China, Malaysia, Brazil, etc. have started doing customer support business raising high competition for the call center in India.

Although India has a large talented pool and graduates wish to take call center jobs in the country, however competition among international countries raises an alarm.

New technologies and changing market needs are also trouble for the Indian call centers. No longer, another country introduces something new, it brings a negative impact on the other countries’ business raising high international rivalry.

Communication gap due to accent issues

This is yet again a big threat to the Indian call centers. The accent-triggered issue is a big problem, as customers’ do not feel answered well when an external agent is not able to answer in the same accent as theirs.

Although a call center in India has agents that fluently speak in the English language, however, accent issue is a challenge for the country’s effective call center performance.

Other global countries speak western-accented English naturally, which is hard for Indian agents to speak.

Decreasing first call resolution

Maintaining FCR rates is hard for businesses and not all companies can effectively manage their first call resolution. FCR helps to build customer satisfaction and plays a vital role in the call center business’ success.

All customers want their calls to be heard early and their query to be redressed right away. Once customers feel they are been transferred to other agents unnecessarily, they leave the service for other better opportunities.

Decreasing FCR is not a good sign for a call center in India. However, it is also true that today's tech-savvy customers have tricky questions, which is not easy for every agent to answer swiftly.

Zero differentiating factors

Most of the call centers, especially those in India focus on speaking the English language and in this course, they neglect French, German, etc.

This is where companies crush their growth prospects, as they are unable to grow under other altered verticals.

Change in western socioeconomic conditions

Call center in India mainly has foreign clients and a change in the political situation of the foreign country can bring big threats to the Indian BPO industry.

If a foreign rule restricts effective outsourcing services, it is bad news for the Indian call centers, as they fail to perform their functions correctly without any hassle.

Moreover, if other countries have better government policies than the Indian call center industry, the customers’ tend to move towards their service rather than outsourcing to Indian BPOs.